Save Our Snakes

I was relieved — and only slightly disappointed — that we didn't see snakes on the road, or anywhere else, during our visit to Dinosaur Provincial Park in southern Alberta. Delores did take this great photo just outside the park, though.

Just like the USA — Alberta, Canada has people with widely-differing opinions. 

The billboard is from the Wexit crowd (the Canadian twist on Brexit, Western Canada Exit, I think). They are unhappy with how the rest of Canada treats their province, so they want to leave Canada. And apparently join the USA. 

This letter to the editor in the Edmonton Journal is a rebuttal of that idea.

Alberta election, April 2019

Long story.

Today we took advantage of advance voting in Alberta’s provincial election. It’s our first time voting as Canadians. Yay! Election day is Tuesday, April 16.

About these pictures: These distinctive bubble-window row houses are in our neighborhood. There’s another set of them a few blocks east of these on the same street. They strike me as very 1970s.

While the bubble windows are ignored by most of the people living in these houses, a few of the windows are decorated with Christmas lights in season.

The political race this month is between candidates of two major parties. The current party in power is the New Democratic Party (NDP). In 2015, they won power from the conservative party of the time, the Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta. This was a huge upset as the Progressive Conservatives had ruled Alberta since the 1970s. The way I understand it, the loss was due to some particularly visible corruption.

The Progressive Conservatives were beaten so badly, they decided to disband and regroup, joining with a more Tea-Party-ish political party, the Wildrose Party, to form the United Conservative Party (UPC).

Around the time the NDP was voted in, Alberta’s lifeblood — the extraction of oil from the Alberta tar sands (most here call them the “oil sands,” only wild-eyed environmentalists use the “tar sands” term) — became much less profitable because of the global collapse of oil prices. The unemployment numbers have grown and anger against the NDP has grown.

So, the United Conservatives are heavily favored to take control of Alberta in this election.

But, at least here in our neighborhood, the New Democrats are still popular. Hence the bubble-window display shown.

Update: United Conservative Party won.

Language alert: Apps

A restaurant chain here is trying to replace the word, “appetizers” with “apps.” They may succeed, but I don’t like it. (From a Facebook ad.)

(Yes, Edmonton has an Ice District. The centerpiece of it is the new-ish hockey arena.)

–Facebook post from Jan. 3, 2019

Update: Also, "Boston Pizza." I guess Chicago or New York Pizza was too on-the-nose for a name for a pizza place.

I didn't know he was a Canadian

Edmonton Journal, May 17, 2019

This morning’s Edmonton Journal has a review of “John Wick 3.” (They didn’t like it.) (I’ll be seeing it in any case.)

The cutline for the accompanying photo starts out: “Canadian actor Keanu Reeves reprises his role as ….” I’m not sure if that’s supposed to be true (IMDB.com says he was born in Lebanon) or an insult or what.

Maybe the cutline writer has Reeves confused with the many, many other actors who are Canadians.

[May 17, 2019 Facebook post]

And whenever the newspaper mentions William Shatner it always has to remind readers that Shatner is Canadian.

Yes, I did go see the third John Wick movie. It was okay. Just as good as "John Wick 2" and not as good as "John Wick 1."

Also Canadian: Raymond Burr.

Forever isn't what it used to be

You say "Permanent" and I say "Forever." Let's call the whole thing off.

Business is slow for the people who hand-deliver personal letters and bill payments. But the postal services of the world (okay, United States, Canada and the United Kingdom) have come up with a way to encourage people to buy postage stamps to make mailing letters less annoying.

Since postage rates are going up on a seemingly yearly basis, postal services now sell stamps that don't have a price on them (called, according to Wikipedia, "Non-Denominated Postage"). The stamps are good for first class letters now and into the future, even if postage rates increase after the stamp was purchased.

In the U.S. they are called Forever stamps, in Canada they're called Permanent stamps, in the U.K. they are simply called First Class stamps. And there's not a price on any of them.

And while I think the idea is good I think some of the executions of the idea are better than others.

The United Kingdom has opted to print "1st" on every stamp. That, in combination with the Queen's silhouette, is all there needs to be on a U.K. stamp. The U.K. doesn't even print the name of the country on the postage. That's confidence.

The United States puts the entire word "Forever" on every stamp. Along with the letters USA. And sometimes the name of whatever is on the stamp. I gotta say I think it gets a little crowded on the U.S. stamps.

Canada's stamps have a very small "P" inside a maple leaf on their stamps. Along with that symbol, stamps must always say, "Canada." (Not to mention the English/French language thing.) The word "Canada" is a bit of a longer word than "USA," so it's for the best that Canada decided against spelling out "Permanent."

A few more examples:

I think the U.K.'s solution is pretty cool. Just having the silhouette and three characters on a stamp can really open up the small space for some fun stuff. And while the silhouette doesn't always work with the subject matter on the stamp, it's generic enough to eventually blend in and be ignored.

A very standard treatment here. The info is there, but it doesn't compete with the artwork.

And when the Queen profile is the main image on the stamp -- then it's the most simple a stamp can be. Clean and classy.

Canada's solution is pretty flexible. The three elements of Permanent logo, country and subject matter label allows for some fun designs.

Again with the unnamed Queen.

This Chinese New Year stamp downplays the symbol. (The English word "Dragon" must be "Dragon" in French, too.)

Lotsa logos here, but the Permanent logo doesn't clash. (Zamboni postage!)

More type on this stamp than most -- including the guy's jersey number. The Permanent logo again, doesn't clash.

The Permanent logo on this one is really downplayed. Because of its size and coloring, it's almost just another letter in the word, "Canada." (Canada and the U.K. have no problem putting living people on stamps. It's a bit of a shock to a born and raised U.S. stamp fan.)

While the U.K. and Canada opt for compact solutions, the United States "Forever" is big and bold and -- sometimes -- a bit much. Putting a label of "Forever" on something implies immortality or invincibility. That can be overbearing. These flag designs, for example.

With the Reagan stamp, the "Forever" is downplayed -- and that's good, in my opinion. Still, the "Forever" hints at the eternal.

The Janis stamp plays up the immortality angle.

The Jimi stamp just lets it kinda fade away into the background.

"Batman / Forever / USA." The "Forever" is getting pretty big play here. Batman forever? Yes, if Warner Bros. has anything to say about it.

One Edmonton newspaper on 27 October 2014

The tabloid Edmonton Sun -- one of two daily papers in town -- seems to be doing quite well indeed. On a Monday, often a slow newspaper day, it was 76 news and entertainment pages and 28 sports pages. Tabloid pages are smaller than regular newspaper pages, yes. But still -- 104 pages. 

Edmonton Sun on Monday, Oct. 27, 2014. Click for larger view.

Sports pages are in a pull-out section in the middle. They are numbered separately from the rest of the paper.

Sports editorial content.

Of 104 pages, 36 pages were vehicle ads.

Car and truck ads.

Not a whole lot of other regular advertising (shown in blue) or classified advertising (in green). Some of these ads are house ads promoting the newspaper itself.

Cars and trucks in red, other ads in blue, classifieds in green.

I have no idea how the finances of the Sun are, but this looks like a pretty healthy Monday paper.

Vehicles = red, other ads = blue, classified ads = green, Sports section = yellow. Click for larger view.

The colors of money

A bank named Canada Trust has named its automated teller machines, "Green Machine." The Green Machine logo is half-clever. It's a dollar sign (same in the U.S. and Canada) that is mutated into a letter "g." This is then used in the confusing manner of an initial cap. So you can read it Green Gmachine or Reen Machine or -- with some effort -- Green Machine.

$reen $machine

That's all fine. But beyond the design is the name itself. The "Green" in the name probably refers to money. In the U.S. paper money bills are called "greenbacks" -- because the U.S. paper currency is mostly green. But in Canada, unless the bank is simply saying "This ATM is painted green," Green Machine is not appropriate because paper money here is not primarily green. Yes, the $20CAN is green, but the other bills are not green in the slightest.

Canadian dollars.

You could argue that most of the bills dispensed from the Green Machine ATMs are green $20CAN bills, but a great deal of red $50CAN bills are also dispensed. 

Red and Green Machine?

On an unrelated tangent, the $20CAN and $50CAN bills are printed on plastic. They have clear stripe areas with hologram stuff going on in the stripes. Kinda fun. And I must say that I've grown fond of the $1CAN and $2CAN coins. They are very handy.

Mystery book cover

I was in a college book store just snooping around as my wife looked for reference books.

My eye was caught by a bookshelf full of orange, white and black book covers.

It was the somewhat familiar Penguin Books look -- not really used in the United States. The shelf looked something like this:

Mock-up of books on display.

At first glance, I thought it was some kind of play on the equals (=) symbol. A gay-lesbian-transgender studies thing -- this being a college book store and all.

On closer examination, I realised the black bars were not of equal width and it dawned on me the title and author had been blocked out for some reason. 

Scan of the book cover.

I was compelled to pick up the book and look at the spine to see what it was. It was George Orwell's "1984" -- or as it says on the spine, "Nineteen Eighty-Four." 

What a fantastic design! A book without the title or the author on the cover! But it makes sense to do that for an edition of "1984."

Even though I do not need a copy of "1984," I spent $13 Canadian on this edition. I was so taken by it. 

The best part about the story is: 

After I got home and more closely examined the book cover I noticed the cover was embossed. The logo and the penguin on the bottom are embossed, and … 

Embossed. Nice.

… THE TITLE AND AUTHOR ARE EMBOSSED ON THE COVER. 

The title and author are indeed on the cover of the book. And they are blocked out. And they are still semi-readable. 

What a fantastic design!

The title and author are there. Click for larger.

I guess this book cover is a tribute/homage to the original Penguin Books covers of the past. I'm not familiar with those book covers, I'm pretty sure they were used in Great Britain only, but in searching around the Internet, I found many representations of the old design. This "1984" cover certainly pays tribute to that design.

Picture stolen from the Internet.

And in searching the Internet for articles about this particular book cover, I found a nice article on the designer, David Pearson. This book is part of a series of reissues of George Orwell's books.

Incidentally, here -- from an Ebay auction -- is a photo of a 1955 Penguin edition of "1984."

No black bars on this one. From Ebay.

7-up cans

The one on the left is the 7-up can used in the United States. On the right, the Canadian version. (I think the rest of the world uses the design on the right as well.) 

The U.S. design is holding on to the shadows and highlights that are typical of 2000s design while the other can has flattened and simplified the design. I'm particularly fond of the red dot doing double duty.

Update: In the comments, Mark Simonson calls my attention to an article on the new 7-up design and expresses a preference for the 1977 version of the can.

This sent me on a Google search that turned up an even more extensive history of the 7-up cans -- plus histories of Pepsi, Coke, Dr. Pepper and more.

I don't get it

An editorial cartoon from the Vegreville, Alberta, Observer. I'm not sure I get all the nuances of this Curatolo cartoon. Being a new resident here I don't know all the ins and outs of provincial rivalry. I've heard that Albertans believe other Canadian provinces are slightly miffed because Alberta has lots of jobs and is making money. Alberta makes its money from oil.

I guess the reader is supposed to take the guy talking as an Albertan working on the oilsands. The punchline being that he cares about "green" because money is green. And then the big switcharoo is that he's in the provence of Ontario, not Alberta.

I don't really get the switches. Alberta digs up the stuff and Ontario refines it? Everyone should be happy and shut up because there are jobs at stake? Albertans aren't hypocrites like people in Ontario?

Whatever the deeper meaning of this cartoon, I do enjoy the Jack Davis-esque drawing style.

Magazine rack in a Canadian grocery store

The magazine rack in this grocery store has a couple of "Feature" spots -- with their own holders in front of the regular rack. I would easily expect People magazine to be featured -- with it's cover story on "627 Spring Looks." But Adbusters? With it's "Canada, Tar Sands, Kyoto, etc., #SwaggerNoMore" cover story? I think that's unusual.

Alternate realities

To me, a principal joy of living in a new place is the differences in graphics. Particularly on very familiar brands.

Left: USA version, right: Canada version.

Coca-Cola is such an international powerhouse, I would have thought the United States and Canadian versions of its cans would be the same. And the 12 ounce (355 mL) cans are the same. But the 7.5 ounce (222 mL) mini-cans are a little different. As much as I love the original returnable glass Coke bottle, I find the constant picturing of it on paper cups, aluminum cans and plastic bottles to be . . . tiring and sad. I understand that it's part of their heritage, but since they are never going to go back to returnable bottles, I wish they would stop rubbing it in my face. Also note the calories label on both cans: United States 90 calories. Canada 100 calories. Perhaps calories are calculated differently in the two countries.

Top: USA version, bottom: Canada version.

When I saw the Canadian Kit Kat logo something resonated. Is it the Gill Sans-like font? Probably not. But the red letters on a white background harken back to the original logo. The Canadian one doesn't look as modern as the United States version, but that's okay.

Top: USA version, bottom: Canada version.

The United States and Canada versions really are the same elements -- just tweaked differently on the different packages. I guess the Canada one adds the large script "Holiday Mix," But that't the only major difference. Again there's the variation in the calories notice on the bags. This time the U.S. comes out on the high side. United States: 210 per serving. Canada: 190 per serving.

Update: Thank you, Mark Simonson, for coming up with the Alternate Reality name for an U.S. citizen's experiences in Canada. Really sums it up.